AlwaysPartying: Barista Competition at RBC NYC

Ashley Poon — June 28, 2010

Left, the signature drink from Counter Culture Coffee’s barista, Katie Cargulio, made at RBC NYC.

Last Thursday, the day of the 2010 World Barista Championship in London, there was also a little friendly coffee competition going in TriBeCa at the new downtown buzz-spot, RBC NYC. Baristas met at RBC to make signature drinks at the behest of its assistant manager, Cora Lambert, who had been inspired by the signature drinks division of the United States Barista Championship (USBC). “Signature drinks bring in the culinary aspect of coffee,” said Cora, “It’s more than pressing a button.”

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AlwaysInformed: Get Your Coffee Fix at RBC NYC

Arthur Bovino — April 14, 2010

The Vietnamese, the signature drink (to stay only) designed by head barista, Cora Lambert, at RBC NYC in TriBeCa.

TriBeCa has more buzz— in the form of RBC NYC that is. There’s no sign outside this new little coffee shop, save a chalkboard that advertises a flashy handmade coffee machine with a thrash metal name: Slayer. But you’re more likely to hear ‘These Eyes’ by The Guess Who than ‘Angel of Death.’ That’s okay— you’re not visiting for music, but for good coffee, friendly service, and a signature espresso shot: The Vietnamese, designed by head barista, Cora Lambert, formerly of The Mercury Dime.

After opening in January, Jodi Richard’s RBC, and the Slayer, have started gaining attention. The machine was handcrafted in Seattle, where according to Jodi, every piece was made by hand. So what’s the big deal? Does it really make a difference in the taste? We were recently invited in to find out.

“The special thing about this machine is that it allows manual pressure profiling, which is a very fancy way of saying that you can manually set the pre-infusion,” Cora said while making a cold-brewed latte.

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AlwaysTraveling: Café du Monde & Central Grocery

Jeff Zalaznick — February 05, 2010

Clockwise from top: Café du Monde, Powdered Sugar-Covered Beignets from Café du Monde, Central Grocery, Muffuletta from Central Grocery.

There is a long checklist for New Orleans eating, and it is no mistake that both Café du Monde and Central Grocery have found themselves at the top of this list for over 100 years._ These Decatur Street institutions are symbols of one of the country’s great cities and a reminder that the people of New Orleans have been eating and drinking better than we have for a long, long time.

When you visit, there is no better way to start your day than by taking a stroll through Jackson Square, sitting outside at Café du Monde and having Chicory Coffee and Beignets, and then strolling down the street to pick up a world famous Muffuletta at the Central Grocery. Last week, I did it three times in a row, and I cannot tell you how natural it felt. It is the most pleasurable morning routine that I have ever experienced. There is no question that both Café du Monde and Central Grocery deserve their iconic reputations.

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Top 5: Affogato

February 04, 2010

The Affogato: hot, bitter espresso poured over sweet ice cream. It’s a great meal-ender.

Affogato, it’s Italian for ‘drowned.’ Gelato drowned in hot espresso— coffee and dessert combined. Sounds like a simple dessert, right?

But there’s nuance involved in what constitutes a great affogato. What kind of espresso? What flavor gelato? Vanilla? No? What kind? And what’s the ratio of one to the other? Is there whipped cream, caramel or chocolate sauce? Toppings— sweet or salty variables scattered on top or served on the side? We kept all this in mind as we set out to find the City’s Top Five renditions.

Click here to find out Always Hungry’s Top 5 Affogato.

Have an idea for a Top 5? We’d love to hear from you. Go to the bottom of a Top 5 page and enter your suggestion into the “Suggest a Top 5” field along with your rankings and your email address.

AlwaysInformed: Starbucks’ Iced Grande Red Eye

Arthur Bovino — September 29, 2009

Starbucks Grande and Venti Iced Red Eyes.

Say what you will about Starbucks, we love their coffee. In honor of today being National Coffee Day, we’re highlighting Starbucks’ perfect coffee drink, the Grande Iced Red Eye, iced coffee with a shot of espresso (black)— a refreshing caffeine jolt that gets right down to the business of waking you up.

The thing to keep in mind about the Red Eye is its proportions. You just can’t go Venti. By upgrading in size, you change the ratio of espresso to coffee. The taste just isn’t as good. When it comes to the Iced Red Eye, we’ll paraphrase Dos Equis’ Most Interesting Man in the World, “Stay Grande, my friend.”

On another Starbucks note, yesterday we tried a preview sample of Starbucks VIA™ Ready Brew (right, Italian Roast, Extra-Bold). The company has a section on their website proclaiming “How Starbucks VIA™ Can Change Your Life,” and their website includes recipes for its use in BBQ sauce, frosting, brownies, braised chicken and custard. Not sure about lives being changed, but we wanted to see if it would work as an instant cold brew coffee, and we have to say, it was pretty good.

Using VIA with cold water from the water cooler and ice leftover from a just-finished grande iced coffee, the results were impressive. There isn’t much of the “soluble, microground coffee,” powder in that foil packet, but as soon as you mix it with water there’s an intense aroma even a foot and a half away. ($9.95/12 packets)

AlwaysLearning: Pão de Queijo

Arthur Bovino — September 04, 2009

Pão de Queijo in Astoria at New York Pão de Queijo, $1.75.

Pão de Queijo (pronounced, pow de KAY-ju, with a nasal ‘ow’) is an addictive, gluten-free, South American salgadinho.

Where it’s from: Pão de Queijo is one of many different salgadhinos (snacks), like Coxinha and Pastels, which you can find everywhere in Brazil. It is most often sold at cafés, where it’s eaten with espresso for breakfast while standing at a counter— though it can be found all day. Variations are said to be found in Bolivia, where they’re known as Cuñapé, and in Paraguay and Northern Argentina where they’re known as Chipás.

What it is: In Portuguese Pão de Queijo means ‘cheese bread.’ Bread isn’t quite accurate— gougère or cheese profiterole is more apt. Basically, it’s a domed cheese puff one to three inches wide, made using Povilho Azedo, cassava flour (tapioca starch) usually with Queijo de Minas cheese inside. Origins are murky, but it’s thought to have been created by slaves who harvested the yucca crops and gathered the starch leftover after processing. Starch was rolled into balls and baked. Later, when cattle-farming became widespread, cheese was introduced. One Brazilian chain that specializes in it, Casa do Pão de Queijo (founded in 1967 in São Paulo), attributes it to the 18th century in the state of Minas Gerais, a region in the Southeast of Brazil, a little less than 300 miles from Rio.

How it’s made: Recipes vary, but generally, milk, oil and butter are first mixed over heat. Then tapioca flour, eggs and cheese are added. After the mixture cools, balls of dough are formed and cooked for about twenty minutes. The combination of tapioca starch and cheese creates a slightly gummy, chewy consistency inside, like a palatable rubber cement. When done right, they are crisp on the outside and light, airy, warm and slightly chewy on the inside with full, cheesy flavor. One of Brazil’s best places for pão de queijo is in São Paulo— Pão de Queijo Haddock Lobo —a little shop in a neighborhood called Jardins Paulista.

Where to get it in New York: There are pockets of Brazilian restaurants downtown (like Casa and Cafe La Palette in the West Village, and one place in the East Village, Esperanto) that serve pão de queijo, as well as a few in Midtown (Emporium Brasil) on what’s left of Little Brazil on 46th Street (“Little Brazil Street”) and also in Newark, and Astoria, Queens.

One AlwaysHungryNY.com favorite spot for pão is New York Pão de Queijo (right), a small café in Astoria. It has other treats including açai na tigela and a bevy of Brazilian fruit juices. Fair warning: once you’ve eaten one, it’s difficult to stop.

AlwaysInvestigating: Dunkin’ Donuts’ Toffee For Your Coffee

The Gluttoness — September 02, 2009

Dunkin’ Donuts’ Create Your Own Donut Contest winner: Toffee For Your Coffee Donut.

The 2009 winner of the Dunkin’ Donuts Create Your Own Donut contest has been unleashed for public consumption and appraisal. Toffee For Your Coffee was one of 130,000 entries. It was dreamt up by Jeff Hager, an accountant from Hoover, Alabama, who combined his favorite donut and his favorite candy bar, topping glazed sour cream cake with chopped bits of Heath Bar.

Hager’s donut doesn’t sound as tasty as some of the those created by other finalists. Consider, as Grub Street reported, the “Sm’OREO,” a marshmallow-filled donut with chocolate icing topped with OREO cookie pieces and graham cracker crunch. But he did have the wherewithal to intertwine the name of his donut creation with Dunkin’s signature product—“coffee”:http://www.alwayshungryny.com/thought-for-food/tag/Coffee/!

Toffee For Your Coffee isn’t available everywhere— we found this limited edition confection at a Dunkin’ Donuts near the corner of Murray and Church Streets (view map) in TriBeCa. The donut was moist, chewy and reminiscent of pound cake with the crushed Heath Bar adding a balanced crunch. Most of us enjoyed it, although it’s hard to wax too poetic, since anything covered with chocolate-coated toffee should be pretty damn delicious. The dense cake held its own against a topping that could have been overpowering. But its simple glaze would have been better with an additional toffee twinge.

Some of us enjoyed the sweetness, others found the combination too decadent for the morning. Perhaps, Hager’s donut would just be better paired with coffee as an after-dinner sweet.

AlwaysInvestigating: Ruby et Violette’s Cookie Dough Ice Creams

Danielle Ingerman — August 14, 2009

It’s easy to miss Ruby et Violette (view site), the quaint sweets shop hidden amongst the brownstones at 457 West 50th St and 10th Avenue. But walking by would be a mistake— inside are some of the city’s most indulgent cookies, and recently, some of its most creative ice creams. The store has been open for about eight years, but was reinvented a few years ago by three sisters, Jenji, Bekah, and Heather Sue Mercer, who created more than 100 cookie types. And these are no average chocolate chip cookies, they’re in line with the store’s motto, “Live Life Richly. Indulge.”

Ruby et Violette makes more conventional cookies like Oatmeal Raisin, Maple Walnut and Peanut Butter Chip, and quirky flavors like Mojito and Champagne Strawberry. But the wilder creations set them apart. Take for example: White Russian, Bananas Foster, and Geisha Seduction (a chocolate, chocolate chip cookie with crystallized ginger and dark chocolate chunks). The store has taken the logical next step, different flavored cookie dough ice creams, a call to arms that The Gluttoness made last August.

Left, Positively Pistachio. Right, Double Shot.

There are 18 flavors available each day (and ten prepackaged pint flavors). Our tasting started with Positively Pistachio, pistachio ice cream with pistachio cookie dough, chocolate chips and chopped pistachios. It was fresh and light with pistachio flavor that was punctuated by the crunch of each nut. Double Shot, coffee ice cream with espresso cookie dough and chocolate chunks had deep coffee flavor, and the smooth espresso cookie dough was sweet with a bitter kick.

Left, Touchdown. Right, Berry Banana Twist.

“Touchdown” featured peanut butter ice cream and “Monday Night Football” cookie dough— chocolate chips and Chex Mix. There wasn’t enough dough to compete with the peanut butter’s richness. Berry Banana Twist was the best flavor we tried. Banana ice cream was the perfect backdrop for white chocolate chips, gooey swirls of chunky strawberry jam, and tangy strawberry cookie dough.

Other interesting combinations include First Kiss (salted caramel ice cream with First Kiss Cookie Dough—dark chocolate cookie dough with caramel and sea salt), and S’mores (marshmallow ice cream with S’mores Cookie Dough, marshmallows, toffee, graham crackers and dark chocolate callets).

AlwaysInformed: New Items at Bouley Market

The Gluttoness — July 27, 2009

Bouley Bakery & Market’s Summer Crab Special

TriBeCa’s game of musical Bouley has resulted in a neighborhood market to brag about.

To recap: Bouley moved from 120 West Broadway to 163 Duane Street, leaving the original Bouley space vacant. Bouley Bakery, once on the ground floor, at 130 West Broadway below Bouley Upstairs, moved into the old Bouley space to become Bouley Bakery & Market, leaving “Upstairs” to expand into its downstairs space. At first, the Bakery’s coffee bar, fresh pastries, quiches, breads, pizzas and rotisserie chickens were joined with a salad bar, hot buffet and an expanded selection of raw meats (poultry and fish). The selection was decent. It was great for a quick, easy dinner, and baked goods were consistently superb. But the new venture was obviously thrown together, and there was plenty of room in the large space for further development.

There has been a new, quiet, but very cool addition:, the arrival of a summer special. On one night there were packaged crab dinners including two crabs, an ear of corn and a lemon wedge. Another evening there were lobster tails. There are also sushi rolls from Upstairs, including: Spicy Tuna, Soft Shell Crab, Eel, Vegetable, Salmon and Avocado, and California rolls. Clear containers of fresh pastas (gnocchi, fuzi, tagliatelle and taglialini) are piled high in the refrigerator above homemade ice cream. Hot and cold buffet items have expanded also, and many of the cold options like tuna salad, cold soba noodles, fingerling potato salad, and beets with walnuts are pre-portioned to grab and go.

These latest additions are dramatic improvements, but Bouley Market is still a work in progress. A made-to-order sandwich station is being readied (prepared sandwiches are now available) and a liquor bar is planned for the dining room. Upon completion, David Bouley will have succeeded in creating TriBeCa’s ultimate upscale cafeteria.